scheduled tasks fail for missing credentials

[JMC13]

We run a few workflows that schedule other workflows to run in the future up to 30 days.  Sometimes those workflows will fail to run and if you click to edit them they say

"task startup user's credentials must be provided.  use the change startup user dialog to do this."

these tasks are all added the same way with the same workflow and im not sure what causes only some to fail. if you update the credentials they all work fine.

fom logs:

2014-07-07 12:30:00.113-0400 [Thread-64] WARN  {} [WorkflowResumeProcessor] User session fix disabled

2014-07-07 12:30:00.113-0400 [Thread-64] ERROR {} [WorkflowRuntimeServiceImpl] Can't execute workflow, no user token

2014-07-07 12:30:00.113-0400 [Thread-64] WARN  {} [TaskRunner] Unable to execute workflow from task

ch.dunes.util.DunesServerException: Can't execute workflow, no user token

[igaydajiev]

Could you provide the version of vCO .

There was similar issue reported recently against vCO 5.5.1.

[Kagome]

well i have a similar error with scheduled Tasks > 30 days (vCO 5.1 / 5.5 / 5.5.1).

e.g. i have a workflow that exports every day a statsictic about the virtual machines.

That workflow works for ~ 1 months and than it failes because the credentials were not correct.

If I edit that Task - enter same Password again, the workflow will run for the next month and fail then again.

Today i detected a setting in vCenter that could cause this Problem:

Log in to vSphere Web-Client -> Manage -> Single Sign On - Configuration.

On Policy - there should be a register card "Token-Policy" The last Option of that Register Card should be something like "Maximum lifetime of a token of type "holder-of-key"" - that value is set to ~ 30 days.

I changed that value to 10 years and will see what happen...

Maybe that adress your problem, too.

[igaydajiev · Accepted solution]

Yep.

There is functionality in vCO responsible for renewing the token. Unfortunately in 5.5.1 this functionality got disabled and tokens are not properly renewed after they are about to expire.

There is already fix in place that will be available in vCO 5.5.2. Possible workaround is to periodically restart the task providing the credentials or file a ticket to GSS and there is patch available. I will check if this can be released in form of KB article so that it is publicly available.

Hope it helps , Ivo.

[JMC13]

yes we are also 5.5.1 

I will look into getting the patch, how stable is the tech preview of 5.5.2 and does that fix this issue?

[JMC13]

some of these never make it to anywhere close to 30 days, could that still be the same issue?

[igaydajiev]

As far as I know there is no technical preview version  of 5.5.2 available.

>some of these never make it to anywhere close to 30 days, could that still be the same issue?

Yes.If the user token was acquired by another workflow/task it will be reused by following tasks .